


listen before i go

by sybilluv



Category: Cyberpunk 2077 (Video Game)
Genre: Complete, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Gen, Heavy Angst, I make myself sad for free, Sad Ending, Short One Shot, Suicide, Suicide Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 03:14:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29644926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sybilluv/pseuds/sybilluv
Summary: A beast that’s never full, gluttony never sated. It will take, and take, and take.And it will keep taking, keep stealing, keep destroying, because Night City is no city of dreams. It’s a city of nightmares, pure and simple. A city of illusions, of false promises, of half-truths and full lies.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 18





	listen before i go

**Author's Note:**

> I took a Tumblr post too seriously and wrote something that made me sad. This post, from Tumblr user jhnnysilverhand, inspired me to write this short one-shot:
> 
> "thinking about misty waiting for v to come down from the roof during the su*cide ending with a sinking feeling in her stomach as more and more time starts to pass and they never do, and she just sort of knows what has happened, and finally goes up to find v’s body before telling vik. maybe she’s close enough to hear the gunshot, maybe she wants to believe it came from someplace else because even though she knew that it was an option, one she even understands, it’s not quite the same as seeing it. but she knows. and i could see her sitting there for a few minutes, before going down to talk to vik, who definitely does not take it with as much calm sorrowful resignation as she does, though he had just laid out the options to v not long before and was well aware of the possibility. he wouldn’t want to believe they’d go for it, not the fighter he knows v to be. and i can’t help but think about what judy was told about evelyn when she died–keep the body on ice until they come for it, because she wasn’t a priority. i imagine with v it would be the same, and they’d have to keep their body in vik’s clinic and for the first time since he started renting out the basement, vik can’t bring himself to be there for a while."
> 
> Any and all mistakes are my own.

It’s been half an hour. 

Misty’s waiting in the esoterica, shuffling her cards, hoping that the thoughtless process will soothe her nerves. She’s confident that V wouldn’t take this long, or maybe they’re just admiring the view from the roof. Taking the time to mull over their thoughts, discussing things with Johnny. Calling her partner, because Misty’s  _ quite _ confident that they’ve found someone during their time spent running around the city, searching for a cure.

That calms the churning in her gut for a few minutes. V’s okay, they wouldn’t.

They  _ wouldn’t. _

Of course, Misty underestimates the weight of their circumstance. Standing, kneeling in front of a death that’s staring them right in the face. They’ve done it once before, watched as death tore one of their closest friends away from them. Watching the life leave Jackie’s eyes, his hands falling limp at his sides, face going slack. His final breath leaving him in a soft whisper.

V is  _ strong. _ Even after losing Jackie they charged forward, kept moving, kept —

Kept moving to keep their mind busy. Kept moving because if they stopped, if they even took a  _ moment _ to try and catch their breath, then the quicksand that is Night City would swallow them whole. A beast that’s never full, gluttony  _ never _ sated. It will take, and take, and  _ take. _

And it will keep taking, keep stealing, keep destroying, because Night City is no city of dreams. It’s a city of nightmares, pure and simple. A city of illusions, of false promises, of half-truths and full lies.

How much has Night City taken from its people? From Misty, it took the love of her life. A gentle soul hardened by years of abuse, of anguish. A soul that took his past, a terrible, haunting thing, and said,  _ “I want to be different. I want to be  _ **_stronger._ ** _ ” _

But the stronger they are, the harder they fall.

Maybe that’s why Misty has that sinking feeling in her gut, the one that’s heavy as she stands at the counter, taking deep breaths of the calming lavender candle she lit after giving V their space. A candle that isn’t helping much. She inhales to blow it out—

And she hears a gunshot. 

Her blood freezes over. She knew, she  _ knew _ that it was an option, pushing herself away from the counter, heart thumping so loud that it’s all she hears when she’s taking the elevator up to the roof. Of course it was an option, one that Misty definitely thought that V might consider but  _ never _ take. Not now, not when they’re so close to ridding themselves of the chip. 

She understands it. But understanding it isn’t the same as walking slowly,  _ so _ slowly out of the elevator to the roof, calling out with a tentative, “V?” Chest burning when she doesn’t get a response. Misty takes one step, then another, one after the other until she’s finally out on the roof.

It was an option. Misty just didn’t think that V would take it.

“Oh, _ V,” _ she manages, tears spilling silently as she walks over to her friend, shakily sitting in the plastic chair next to V’s. Misty curls in on herself, sits and listens to the muted sound of the city below.

Taking and taking and taking. An endless,  _ vicious _ cycle.

She doesn’t know how long it takes for her to get up again. She just stands up slowly, walks back toward the elevator, and wipes at her eyes as she walks to Viktor’s clinic. It feels like hours, that short walk, and it’s so hard to just walk in. Misty has to tell him.

Vik turns from his desk at her footsteps, turning away from the monitor in front of him, shutting it off immediately. “Misty. Where is—”

Misty shakes her head. “I heard the gunshot. I had a bad feeling but I didn’t want to believe...” She takes a shaky breath. “They’re gone, Vik.”

A beat. Two. Viktor stands abruptly from his chair, which rolls back and hits his desk with enough force to rattle everything on it. “No. No, no, they— they wouldn’t. They...” When Misty doesn’t move, only watches Viktor with glistening, red-rimmed eyes, he has to stretch out a hand to rest it on his desk. His legs are shaking like twigs, bottom lip trembling. “No,  _ V...” _

He’d laid out the options before V. Every option, even the one that he didn’t want to think about them taking. Not V, fighter and a fucking  _ stubborn _ mule, fighting against their fate, the fact that they were on borrowed time from the very instant Takemura had hauled them to his clinic.

Viktor curses, clenches his hand into a fist and  _ slams  _ it into his desk, eyes burning because  _ fuck, _ he just lost another friend. Another one that didn’t stay, another one lost to the fucking shitshow that is Night City.

Misty gives him the time, lets him slam his fist against his desk until his knuckles are bleeding. Until he’s slumped in his chair again, fat tears slowly rolling down his cheeks. “We... we have to put them on ice. Until they come and get them,” she says, voice so quiet that she can barely even hear herself. She’s not sure that Viktor hears her until he’s standing again, walking past her with a steeled look toward the abandoned apartment complex.

They’re both deathly silent on the way, on the ride up. Vik gasps, choked and devastated when he sees V, slumped over and blood dyeing their shirt, their necklace.

He gathers them up through blurred vision, a sob wracking his body again when he hears V’s pistol clatter against the concrete. He weeps on the way down, cries all the way through slowly putting V’s body in a cooler and closing the lid on top of them. It’s  _ fucked _ up and inhumane, he thinks, leaving them in there.

Viktor stays by the cooler until they’re taken away, and his clinic his closed for the next two weeks, because he knows that V’s blood is on the floor, in that cooler. Their blood was on his hands.

Taking, and taking, and taking.

Another friend lost.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.


End file.
